Kurds rally in Paris for faster inquiry into activist killings

PARIS (Reuters) - Thousands of Kurdish demonstrators from around Europe marched in Paris on Saturday to call for a speedier investigation into the murder of three Kurdish activists a year ago.

Sakine Cansiz, a founder of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) in the early 1980s, and two other Kurdish women were found shot dead in Paris in January 2013.

Carrying banners reading “Turkish state the murderer, France the accomplice”, demonstrators accused the Turkish state of being behind the murders and criticized the French judiciary for what they said was the slow pace of the investigation.

“Today it has been one year since the murder and we still have no answers to our all questions,” Rezan, a Kurdish student living in France, told Reuters. She declined to give her family name.

Pro-Kurdish protesters attend a demonstration called European Demonstration March For Truth And Justice in Paris January 11, 2014. REUTERS/Gonzalo Fuentes

Chief suspect Omer Guney, a Turkish immigrant in France, was placed under formal investigation within about a week of the triple murder.

Sources told Reuters in October that French investigators had collected evidence about Guney’s connections to Turkey, and the magistrate in charge of the case was about to lodge a formal appeal for information to Turkey.

Pro-Kurdish protesters attend a demonstration called European Demonstration March For Truth And Justice in Paris January 11, 2014. REUTERS/Gonzalo Fuentes

Turkey has denied any involvement in the murders, suggesting instead they were related to internal disputes in the PKK.

The PKK is outlawed as a terrorist organization by Turkey, the United States and the European Union.

“The investigation is not making progress, we want justice,” said Ali, another demonstrator in Paris, who also declined to give his family name.

Reporting by Pauline Ades-Mevel; Writing by Geert De Clercq; Editing by Sophie Hares